What was the exact moment the fraud began? What should he have done instead?
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Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
581–590 of 1001 posts
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#582When are we going to stop calling him a “book smart kid who lacked common sense and things spiralled out of control” to “scam artist who is too dumb to keep his mouth shut”? There is no evidence this person is smart in any way, yet some people still portray it as a narrative. There are dumb people at MIT (and at every institute or company) let’s admit it.
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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#583What about the politicians who happily took the bribes?
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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#584I was reading the trial report by Inner City Press. The AUSAs were incredibly thorough and strategic. The evidences were air-tight, the cross-examination was masterfully controlled with precision and incisiveness, and of course the closing argument was forceful. It was a great joy to read the report, as if I was watching an extended episode of The Good Fight. On the other hand, the defense was really weak, quite hand…
> on political donation,
Fact is, this could have helped him and his company, eventually.
Another two or three years of very sympathetic (bought) politicians on his side and his business could have become legit as a result of those politicians forcing the liquidation/closure of almost all SBF's competitors (certainly Binance would have become bust), and the US "standing behind" FTX as a beloved crypto assed in the fight against China. I.e. very, very similar to what's happening now with AI and with people like Sam Altman.
Which is to say that I'm surprised to see that the defence hasn't pushed more on that "SBF was just a pawn in the hands of very corrupt politicians"-card, that could have worked given a politically divided jury.
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#585> You’d think this MIT graduate would wise up, but he never did. The MIT campus has a major public road running through the middle of it, one of the busiest surface streets in the area. You don't have to stand there very long to see a crowd of students almost get hit by a car because they didn't look before they crossed the street. Point is, the old cliche is true, there really is such a thing as a person with a lot…
His problem was not a lack of common sense. His problem was he was dishonest, a conman, and a thief.
He can (and does) have multiple problems.
It's not like because he made one really bad decision, none of this other bad decisions exist anymore.
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#586Earlier quoted context omitted.
Worked in crypto and I got that vibe so left. Regret it. For every SBF there are hundreds who get away with it. Tons of talentless crypto millionaires still roaming free. Look at the Axie Infinite guys plundering a whole country. Token could collapse, but there’ll be no justice and they’re sitting on at least 8 figures individually
Wait. Do you regret leaving? Because the fraud works out for some?
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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#587When are we going to stop calling him a “book smart kid who lacked common sense and things spiralled out of control” to “scam artist who is too dumb to keep his mouth shut”? There is no evidence this person is smart in any way, yet some people still portray it as a narrative. There are dumb people at MIT (and at every institute or company) let’s admit it.
I agree. The more we learn, the more he looks like a tweaked out Miles Bron. He doesn't seem to understand how anything actually works.
I think the narrative is to cover up the bruised egos of the powerful people and institutes (Jane Street, MIT, investors) that got scammed or thought he was smart.
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#588I liked the article detailing how poorly he did on the stand: https://www.thefp.com/p/humiliating-cross-examination-sam-ba... “Did you say in private, ‘Fuck regulators?’ ” “Did you call some customers ‘dumb motherfuckers?’ ” “Did you fly to the Super Bowl in a private plane?” “Most FTX customers did not have a line of credit, correct?” “Do you deny that Alameda had a $65 billion line of credit?” And on, and on, and o…
> Under the circumstances, SBF’s wisest course would have been to just say yes—or yep—to her questions. Why did he take the stand at all?
Apparently he gave some better than expected testimony on direct
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#589> You’d think this MIT graduate would wise up, but he never did. The MIT campus has a major public road running through the middle of it, one of the busiest surface streets in the area. You don't have to stand there very long to see a crowd of students almost get hit by a car because they didn't look before they crossed the street. Point is, the old cliche is true, there really is such a thing as a person with a lot…
> there really is such a thing as a person with a lot of book-learning but less common sense than a sea slug
I don't even think SBF had the book-learning, just intellectual arrogance. "I don’t want to say no book is ever worth reading, but I actually do believe something pretty close to that. I think, if you wrote a book, you f---ed up, and it should have been a six-paragraph blog post."
Re: Sam Bankman-Fried Convicted
#590For anyone curious, Ken White has a good and entertaining article breaking down maximum sentences in print (here, 110 years) and what people actually serve. It's worth a read: https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc... A takeaway: "1. Maximum sentences have very little relation to actual sentences in federal law. When the government quotes the maximum sentence, they are trying to scare you. When…
> Responsibility is not a zero-sum game.
So it's not the case that when one person is responsible, someone else has to be irresponsible to balance things out?